More or less by surprise, Apple yesterday launched the new Smart Battery Cases To the XS iPhones, XS Max and XR after a year of absence (no official accessory of its kind has been released for the iPhone X after all).

The return of those who were not was accompanied by a great deal of curiosity about the technical specifications of the hoods, as Ma as usual did not disclose this kind of information to the four winds. But everything has a solution: today, the editor of Wirecutter Nick Guy got his hands on the Smart Battery Cases on the XS and XS Max iPhones and could get a better look at their features.

The most surprising of Guy's findings is the capacity of the batteries: in both cases, the parts have 1,369mAh, which represents a brutal drop compared to Smart Battery Cases for the iPhone 6 (1,877mAh) and especially for the iPhone 7 (2,365mAh) drops of 27% and 42% respectively.

Speaker / mic openings on the bottom. pic.twitter/Q322JqHXRt

– Nick Guy (@thenickguy) January 16, 2019

Microphone openings and speakers at the bottom.

As already announced by Apple, the accessories make the longevity of the handsets jump to 33 hours (iPhone XS) and 37 hours (iPhone XS Max) in talk time ie even with diminished capacity, cases do a good survival. gadgets. Focusing on the numbers, the iPhone XS case can give just over 50% charge to the device (which has a 2,658mAh battery); the case of the XS Max, about 43% (the battery of the device has 3,174mAh); If the case of the XR has the same capacity, provide approximately 46% battery (the battery of the device itself is 2,942mAh).

Other details deserve attention, such as the fact that Apple does not mention, for the case for the iPhone XS, backwards compatibility with the iPhone X At least according to the official information in your box. In addition, the accessory is basically the same height as the cases for the 6/7 iPhones, even with a much larger device because the ?chin? at the bottom has been eliminated, making it look much more elegant.

6 / 6S, 7, XS, XS Max. Notably, XS is the same height as the 6/7 series models, thanks to the lack of a chin. pic.twitter/hpeRtgQJHO

– Nick Guy (@thenickguy) January 16, 2019

6 / 6S, 7, XS, XS Max. Remarkably, the case of the XS has the same height as the covers for the 6/7 iPhones because of the chin removal.

It is worth noting, however, that we now have a wireless charging coil inside the case, which undoubtedly took up space that was previously occupied by battery.

By the end of the week, Guy should get his hands on the Smart Battery Case for iPhone XR; When this happens, we know if the third accessory has the same battery capacity as its brothers, which should be the case.

via MacRumors

Update 1/16/2019 5:50 PM

On a tweet Guy later corrected an important point that had previously been overlooked: even though the new case batteries have a lower milliamperh (mAh) count, they have a higher watts-hour (Wh) count: 10.1Wh, to more accurately, against 7.13Wh for the iPhone 6 case and 8.98Wh for the iPhone 7 accessory. In other words, the new Smart Battery Case has, in fact, a larger capacity than their predecessors.

Confused? This article from TecWorld It explains the issue in more depth, but basically speaking, the classification of batteries per milliamp-hour does not accurately represent their capacity, since it does not take into account the voltage at which the energy is transmitted. The new Smart Battery Cases double the voltage compared to their predecessors, increasing capacity and charging devices faster.